Publishing online

Techniques in publishing are changing so fast that librarians can scarcely keep up. One of the newest ventures starting this month is Scribd.com a site that will offer authors a chance to upload books, documents, stories, articles or whole books and then selling them. According to a N.Y. Times article, the author will receive 80 percent of the sales price--far more than authors receive as royalties on print books. The trick, of course, will be in the marketing. How will potential readers learn about what's available? Will they be willing to purchase books from new and untested authors who haven't been vetted by a publisher or reviewed by a critic? It's expected that the price of the books will be low, perhaps two dollars each, so buying one is more like buying an extra coffee rather than buying a book. And an author could offer a chapter free or at very low cost so the reader could sample the goods before investing the full price. It's impossible to know how this experiment will turn out, but important for librarians to follow. Will we be building collections this way in the future?